


Dreamscape

by Mangacat



Category: Dexter (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-15
Updated: 2013-01-15
Packaged: 2017-11-25 09:06:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/637297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mangacat/pseuds/Mangacat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dexter Morgan reflects on actions and consequences in an attempt to find his place in life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dreamscape

**Author's Note:**

> Unbelievably, I managed a Hail Mary and completed my bingo line just in time for the big finish. This is for the hc_bingo prompt: ostracized by society.

For all the gruesome and ugly things I’ve done without batting an eye, I have never had trouble sleeping soundly. A few weird dreams here and maybe even what you would call nightmares, but by and large my sleep is blissfully undisturbed. This might sound strange, since I’ve found so many horrors in my past that were not my own doing one would think some of that clings to me. And it does, in its own way, but that hasn’t ever kept me up at night.

Is it the rational outlook on life and death, blood, the weird skewered way my world works, keeping all the different sides of me separate to the point where I cannot tell anymore how they all fit together? Things are changing though, feelings, priorities, life has a different quality to me than it had years ago, before family happened, growth, love. Somewhere, as the detachment has lessened, as I’ve found things I want to live for, even kill for beyond any point of reason or the Code… I have become touchable for anxiety, the fear of loss; entangling emotions that interfere with my ability to do what my urges tell me without letting them take over, becoming uncontrollable and dangerous.

The fear of exposure has been a constant companion all my life, drilled into me by my father as he shaped me to become a weapon, a predator, a judge… an executioner. But it was always infused with the feelings of duty, of propriety, the need to consider the impact the revelation of my true nature would have on my family, the people I love – a circle that has inexplicably grown quite large over the years. It has never touched me directly; on the contrary, there was always this niggling thought, this temptation of getting caught just to be _seen_ for once in my life for who I really am.

But now, the possibility of people knowing, the way they would react to me and my secrets laid open, the damning judgment, crowds with signs parading in front of whatever prison they’d dump me in, clamoring for my execution… the hate in people’s eyes when they look at me knowing what I’ve done, some commending me in the furthest corners of their minds and hating me all the more for it. They’re closing in on me and suddenly I fear much less for my reputation, or propriety, or family, but for the life I’ve built for myself.

It’s worth more to me now than just the kills I made and the plots and schemes I survived, all those times I was _better, smarter, faster_ than the countless others that have become my prey.

It haunts my dreams and keeps me awake at night, this fear.

Does that make me more human?


End file.
